Twitter tests cashback offers to build consumer loyalty

Twitter is no stranger to the development and testing of advertising and marketing tools, with previous experience in this field. This time, they will experiment with cashback services in order to bring brands and customers closer.

Entitled “Twitter Offers”, this new service will be tested with several American brands during the holiday season. Companies will be able to offer cashback rewards in their tweets, in the form of refund offers, discounts or promotions. These offers will be directly added to consumer’s credit or debit cards.

How does it work?

The “cards” which help to provide additional content on tweets (such as photos, extracts of articles or routes), also offer the ability to display promotions. When a twitter user notices an interesting promotional offer on his timeline, he can link it directly to his credit or debit card using the button “Get offer”. Twitter gives this example: a cashback offer of two dollars for any order over $5 in a specific coffee shop in New York City. The development of this feature has been carried out by CardSpring company, which was bought by Twitter in July 2013.

Once the transaction is made, either on the company website, via an application or in store, the discount will be returned automatically to the customer’s bank account, with the wording “Twitter * [dealer name].” No need for any more discount coupons hidden deep your handbag! When a user adds an offer to his or her credit card, Twitter saves the customer’s bank information and stores it in encrypted form. This makes things easier the next time they wish to benefit from such an offer, but the storage of such information will obviously not please everyone. Those who object will be allowed to delete their account information at any time.

An effective ROI measure

The whole process is carried out via Twitter and via the consumer’s credit card. Traders do not have to invest in new payment tools, online or in store! This also means that there is no specific training for their employees.

Another advantage of “Twitter offers” is the possibility to measure effectively the ROI (Return on Investment) of these campaigns carried out on Twitter, for purchases made both in store and online. In order to correctly target their promotions and optimize their performance, companies can also make use of the Twitter targeting tools.

To be kept up to date with the latest news concerning Twitter’s commercial innovations, you can follow the @TwitterCommerce account.